"A year later, approximately four years ago, she and my other daughter, Maria, spent six weeks at Atlantic City in the early spring. It was there that she got into trouble. I could detect it in her letters. Some tremendous sorrow or difficulty had overtaken her, and she was fighting it alone.
"Her husband was not with her. I wrote to Maria asking her to investigate quietly, to report to me whether there was anything I could do.
"Maria's report was unsatisfactory. She knew Enid was distressed and was giving away or risking in some manner large amounts of money—even pawning her jewelry, jewelry which I had given her and which she prized above everything else. The whole thing was a mystery, Maria wrote. The very next mail I received a letter from Enid asking me to lend her two thousand dollars.
"She made no pretence of explaining why she wanted it. She didn't have to explain. I was a rich man at that time, comparatively speaking, and she knew I would give her the money.
"I mailed her a check for two thousand, but on the train which carried the check I sent a private detective—not to make any arrests, you understand, not to raise any row or start any scandal. I merely wanted to find out what or who troubled her. Women, you know, particularly good women, are prone to fall into the hands of unscrupulous people.
"Four days later the detective reported to me, but it was of no special value. He couldn't tell me where the two thousand had gone. If Enid had paid it to a man or a woman, the fellow had missed seeing the transaction. With the description of the jewels I had given him, however, he made a round of the pawnshops in Atlantic City and learned that all of them had been pawned—for a total of seven thousand."
"Pawned by whom—herself?" asked Bristow.
"No. They were pawned in different shops by a man with a gold tooth and a thick, chestnut-brown beard."
"No wonder you doubt the negro's guilt!" exclaimed Braceway.
"Excuse me," put in Bristow quickly, "but did you ever mention this to Mr. Withers?"